It's been mentioned already here, and it's mentioned rather prominently on all of their FAQ pages:

Quote:

What is PrimeInstant Video?Primeinstantvideos provide unlimited, commercial-free, instant streaming of thousands of movies and TV shows at no additional cost with a $79 annual Amazon Prime membership, which also includes fast shipping along with other benefits. Primeinstantvideos can be watched instantly on a Mac, PC and nearly 200 models of Internet-connected TVs, Blu-ray players and set-top-boxes that are compatible with Amazon Instant Video. All of the movies and TV shows are commercial-free and some areavailable in HD.

Primeinstantvideos require an Amazon Prime membership and arenot included with the free shipping benefits provided by Amazon Mom, Amazon Student, or if you are a guest of an Amazon Prime member.Primeinstantvideosare only available to customers located in the United States. At this time, Primeinstantvideosare only available for streaming and cannot be downloaded to a TiVo box or the Unbox Player.

Because I just connected to Amazon Video On Demand via my Sony Blu-Ray (it's a BDP-S570) and there's a new section for "PrimeInstantVideos." I'm browsing them now, and each movie I've selected thus far shows an SD version and an HD version. (Clockwork Orange, Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest, One Flew Over the Cukoo's Nest, and a few others.)

I select the HD version, confirm that the rental price is $0.00, it checks my connection, and a few seconds later, it starts to play the video on my 53" TV. Looks great.

Some titles don't have an HD version.

Only one title in my quick test showed a price for the HD version, and that was Dirty Harry.

hmmm- the blurb i saw on another forum said that and so i checked. I quickly just looked at "scooby doo wheres my mummy" (cause it was right there on the front page) and had some wording that it was 'also available in hd on my tv'- i assumed that it meant it wasn't available in HD via the prime thing- but sounds like i misinterpreted it.

No, if you look more closely, that image (and that ad) is talking about Amazon Video On Demand (it even mentions 90,000 titles.) That DOES work onTiVo... and has for years.

"PrimeInstant" is a subset of that... a new add-on feature... and TiVo is the one device in the Amazon VOD-supported list that doesn't work with PrimeInstant's ~5,000 titles. So that's why the asterisk is there.

These titles don't download, they stream, and that's apparently a compatibility issue with how TiVo's Amazon app works.

When you see it that way, you'll then realize, that perhaps the asterisk isn't meant to imply that PrimeInstant is on it's way to TiVo anytime soon. It might never arrive. This is TiVo, after all -- they're not exactly known for being on-the-ball. The asterisk just lets us know that TiVo's compatibility with Amazon VOD isn't as complete as the other devices'.

Seems bizarre that Amazon would put the TiVo logo (and a TiVo DVR) in that picture but then have the * notavailable note unless the intent is for it to be available in the future.

I think that page is simply showing devices that offer Amazon On-Demand. They had to add the asterisk for Tivo with the free prime intro so as to not mislead customers.

BTW, I'm an Amazon Prime member and have a Vizio TV with internet (as well as a Tivo) and last night tried a free Amazon movie on the Vizio. I thought the picture quality was quite good. I already have been using the Vizio Netflix app instead of the inferior Tivo app, so now, I guess I'll use Vizio for Amazon Prime, as well. (Although, unlike Netflix, the Amazon search capability on the Vizio is not as good).

It would be nice if tivo got it's act together and stayed up to date on features that others offer.

man oh man. I still love my tivo (2 premiers and 1 hd), but it pains me to see that tivo is pretty much the only box which could do amazon VOD but cant do this streaming. I hope they fix this soon, but I'd put this into the category of yet another ball that tivo has dropped. Streaming is vital and tivo is losing it.

My thoughts exactly -- once again Tivo seems to be wasting another opportunity and acting overly complacent by relying too much on their "core competency." instead of aggressively keeping up with innovation. Reminds me of some Pink Floyd lyrics: "No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun" Tivo, don't let life pass you by.....

I wonder if it will be HD quality with Dolby Digital 5.1 sound? I know very little of Netflix content is this way. Just me, but I didn't fork out a few thousand for an HD TV and a TivoHD to watch non-HD/DD content. Of course, can't stream to the Tivo right now anyway, but it would be interesting if they DO stream HD with Dolby Digital sound.

Also Torchwood, Children of the earth. While there are a bunch of TV shows available in HD for Prime streaming, I can't find any movies. Of course, you could rent them. Also, there's a few titles that arenot listed as HD but do play in HD (i.e. The Doctor Who special mattack cited). I've thrown some screen shots of this up on my blog listed below.

I can't find any Prime streaming content in 5.1 surround. However, if you turn on Dolby Pro Logic on your receiver you will get surround sound. Not as good as true Dolby Digital but it's better than stereo.

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To better answer m_jonis' question. The Amazon client on Roku (and other devices) does support Dolby Digital 5.1 when it streams. There's lots of shows you can buy or rent that are in HD and Dolby Digital 5.1. Unfortuantely, none of them appear to be available under prime's streaming.

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I have a ROKU and the Amazon Prime is a new item in the list (Search, HD Movie Rental, Movies, HD TV shows, TV Shows, Special Deals, Your Video Library, and Help). It shows without Prime the show would cost $1.99 and with it $0.00. My box does HD @ 720P (which is probably as good as the shows were originally shot in) and it looks great! So far nothing has streamed (watch 3 complete 1 hour tv shows) in less than HD. ROKU you don't get to choose it goes by whether the internet is fast enough.

Amazon onTiVo is very different than it is on other devices. It's more akin to downloading to a PC than streaming to a device.

That has some benefits such as better quality (bit rate) and 1080p/24 video as opposed to the 720p video for streaming. Up till now there, other than the short wait required to start watching on download, there were no negatives. Prime "free" streaming is the first negative.

On an unrelated note. I subscribed to Prime last year and apparently it auto renews itself since I just got billed $79 a few days ago.

That leads me to a possible loophole in the "free" streaming. You can get a refund on your prime purchase if you haven't used it since purchasing it. If they haven't updated their system to count free streaming as using it, you can get a refund as long as you don't use free 2 day shipping. I'd think Amazon would have considered this, but you never know.

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you have to logon to facebook to see that - any chance of copying the text here?

Quote:

Originally Posted by TiVo

TiVo is working with Amazon on this. No details regarding timing areavailable now, but we do plan to have this available in the future.

Maybe they are trying to get primevideos to be allowed for download to TiVo. Or maybe they will finally update the Amazon application. It's the only implementation of Amazon that I know of that doesn't let you see your video library from the TiVo so it needs updating any way (along with YouTube, Netflix, etc).

you have to logon to facebook to see that - any chance of copying the text here?

I will try

Anthony's Profile ˇ TiVo's Profile
Anthony DeHartTiVo
Any news on if/when Tivo will support the new Amazon PrimeInstant streaming service? And, just as importantly, will it be availableon the Tivo HD or Series 3 platform?
Tuesday at 10:40am
Steve Lemke likes this..
MZ MegaZone Technologically I don't know of a reason why they couldn't support the streaming service just like the downloads on all three platforms (S3/HD/Premiere).

Hmm, check out http://www.amazon.com/gp/video/ontv/ontv - not that the TiVo logo is in ...the list of devices with instant support. Then note the asterisk and "*Prime instantvideosarenotcurrentlyavailableonTiVodevices." But it seems implied that they will be.See More
Tuesday at 12:51pm.Bill Blackwell When do we get this? Seems like a big miss not to have this at launch.
Tuesday at 1:16pm.MZ MegaZone I'm guessing it requires and update to the client on the TiVo so, at the least, it is tied to TiVo's update cycle.
Tuesday at 5:07pm.TiVo TiVo is working with Amazon on this. No details regarding timing areavailable now, but we do plan to have this available in the future.
Tuesday at 7:41pm ˇ 1 personLoading....Gabe Gagliano Please don't forget the Series3 folks!
12 hours ago ˇ 1 personLoading....

Maybe they are trying to get primevideos to be allowed for download to TiVo. Or maybe they will finally update the Amazon application. It's the only implementation of Amazon that I know of that doesn't let you see your video library from the TiVo so it needs updating any way (along with YouTube, Netflix, etc).

if it was my project to run I would be looking to come up with some framework that would allow BROWSING of either Netflix or Amazon for streaming titles.

I would think the current Tech would allow to add in Streaming Amazon titles to TiVo search and you get them but the TiVo search is just not the same kind of fun as say Netflix on a gaming console where you can browse various genres by moving rows of DVD box covers around

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I used Amazon Primeinstantvideos to start watching the MI-5 series last night. Works great. Of course, that's on both my Panasonic 3D Blu-ray player and through my Panasonic 3D plasma display, using Viera Cast, not via a TiVo device.

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My new TV (Samsung UN55C6800) is Internet enabled. I never thought I would use that feature, but I may have to actually read the manual and figure out how to turn it on. I have Prime, so I'd like to see how well this works.

I'm very happy with "TiVo and TV", and have never Netflix'ed or VOD or any of that stuff. But I'll at least check this out.

Another reason not to ever buy hardware expecting things to work in the future. No Hulu still and now I'm disappointed the Amazon prime video isn't included. I almost bought a second TiVo premiere last week assuming this service would work.